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The 3 S’s. (Reading, Singing and Speaking.)

Okay so clearly there aren’t three S’s, but I kind of wanted to call it that anyway, because reading is arguable a type of seeing, so it’s close enough in my own abstract way.

These are the basics. Ideally you should be doing all three of these, everyday. If you can’t then at least one of these. But realistically, if you don’t have time to listen to (and preferably sing along with) one song a day, read a few sentences and say some words either via text or, or dare you pick up the phone and call a friend…then perhaps you shouldn’t be learning a language, because it sounds like you don’t even have 5-10 minutes to yourself everyday, so you might want to figure out what’s going on and then maybe consider doing one of the three while you’re pooping.

Reading is immensely beneficial in developing, literacy and grammar, without actually studying grammar or doing grammar drills. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSW7gmvDLag . (Also I should note that I’m not against studying grammar, I just find that it is often better served as a peripheral material or something to be examined in depth once you’ve reached a certain point in comprehension.)

Singing, is perhaps something that’s overlooked in it’s power. I attribute my French accent to having come about after learning to sing along with several French songs that I found interesting. Key point being that it was interesting, and I really enjoyed the sounds of the song as well as the lyrics.

Interest: This is something that needs to be present in all of your language learning aspects as soon as possible and as often as possible. If you’ve got boring content, you’re going to be bored and not want to continue doing something everyday for several months. I find it’s especially important in Reading.

With singing and learning how to sing along with songs, I’d even say that in the early phases complete comprehension is not necessary. There are several songs that I know in Japanese and can sing along to and only have a vague idea of what I’m saying, but often times as I progress in my study, more of the song is unlocked, or when I have a day where I’m bored I’ll actively look up more of the song, but not more than I can eat! As was mentioned in my last post.

If you’re like most people you probably tell yourself that language is language. But you’re wrong. In my opinion, you are anyway. Language is just incomprehensible gibberish sound. Until you attribute meaning. Too often, people who struggle with accents or pronunciation do so, I believe, because they’re trying to say language sounds, using the languages they already know. But forget all that. Just hear it as sound. Think of the way you might try to imitate an animal sound, like a dog barking or a guitar, twanging, you’re not going to give the dog an English or French accent, if you’re half decent at imitating, and I postulate that we all are, because we learned at least one language so far.

Another bonus to singing, is that you get practice speaking faster than you may be ready to, which can in turn help you later on or even currently, because you’re becoming more accustomed to the new way of moving your mouth and to producing new sounds.

And that brings us to the last aspect. Speaking doesn’t always have to be spoken, so long as you’re doing the other 2, it’s acceptable to miss this on occasion, the important thing that I’ve found, is to be producing comprehensible output, even if it’s only two sentences or half sentences. If you’re taking in stuff, eventually you’re going to have stuff that you’d like to express.

Some argue that you need to start speaking right away, other’s suggest waiting a certain amount of time, I think you should do what feels right. But speaking/writing is pretty high up there and I do think it’s better to start sooner rather than later, at least if you plan on ever speaking and being understood by native speakers.
So what’s important? Reading, singing and speaking in your target language. Are there other important aspects? Obviously. Otherwise I would only have one post ever. Along with listening to content, i.e television shows or podcasts as often as possible, I don’t go a day without hitting all of these three aspects. And if you’re serious about being serious then take yourself less seriously, but don’t forget to learn. Learning when done well is fun and pain free, unless you’re learning how to enjoy sado-masochism, then you might experience some pain…
Until then.